A whisky primer with tasting tips, reviews and recipes by Shane Helmick.

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As winter wraps up I find myself with a heady case of bronchitits. Between the steroids, antibiotics, and spirit-quest inducing cough syrup, I haven’t been able to review any whisky and can barely get my head straight enough to write. I feel bad for not updating, like I’m slowly killing my blog with neglect, so I figured now was as good a time as any to jump on the nearest bandwagon, write a puff piece to pass the time, and let you all know I’m still alive.

Bloggers are an ugly breed. The central tenet almost every public blogger indulges is that they believe, at least a little bit, that people actually care what they have to say. I’m certainly not free from this criticism, either, as illustrated by today’s post, but enough about me. There’s a shit-storm of ego brewing down here in blogger-land and the bell ringing in the distance may be tinnitus, but it might also be a call to arms from the flying stone godhead, instructing us bloggers to get our self-absorbed knickers up in a collective twist about the battle in Tennessee. “Zardoz speaks to you,” it says, “The gun is good. The penis is evil.” We are the chosen ones.

This time, the battle is about the legal definition of Tennessee Whisky taking shape around Brown-Forman, the guns/owners of Jack Daniel’s, and Diageo, megalithic steward of phallic whisky doom. To sum it up, last year, Jack Daniels put the final nail in the Jack Daniel’s isn’t Bourbon debate by championing legislation that mandates Tennessee Whisky is Bourbon made in Tennessee and maple charcoal filtered. Considering there are already a handful of Bourbons out there that use the Lincoln County Process of maple filtering, this whole debacle suddenly takes a predictable turn for the inane.

It’s all kind of like saying a Tennessee Death Sled has to be a yellow Mitsubishi Lancer. So you go out, buy a yellow Mitsubishi Lancer, and then drive it to your buddies house to show off your new acquisition (and your questionable taste in vehicles). When you get there your buddy is all like, “Sweet new Lancer, Joe,” to which you smugly reply, “It’s not a goddman Lancer; it’s a Tennessee Death Sled. They just changed the law.” No muthafucker. It’s a stupid, yellow Lancer, but way to tie up our legislators’ valuable time with your dumb shit.

Zed Cowdery: Brutal, Loves Jack, Hates the Penis

Well, now, Diageo wants to dip its beak in while the turd is still hot and change the law to some equally cryptic nonsense that would allow it not to have to use maple charcoal, new casks or age it in Tennessee, so it’s time for the Brown-Forman lobbyists to put on their hero capes and save the fancy new title they have for their terrible cars, er, whisky.

Bloggers like Chuck Cowdery and Mark Gillespie are reporting that the branding of Tennessee Whisky is under attack and that Diageo is merely trying to damage the category by letting it become flooded with inferior product. Accusations that Tennessee Whisky is a category about to be flooded with dozens of new, paint-thinner brands leaves out the simple truth that the category is already plagued with terrible paint-thinner whisky, namely, Jack Daniel’s. This is also a great example of people trying to trademark or otherwise corner plain expressions of words to bully their competition out of business. They should team up with the guys at Chick-fil-a who seem to think the phrase Eat More is a Truett Cathy invention and can only be used to sling homophobic chicken sandwiches.

Really, it all seems to me like the world’s most boring publicity stunt, and we’re all helping out by keeping the story alive. Saying Jack Daniel’s added value to something with their watery contribution to fraternity mixers is laughable to me, and trying to take credit for something as uncomplicated as the way people traditionally make whisky in your state is just about as arrogant as taking up the keyboard and blogging about it.

Comedy and whisky can certainly mix. Even biting sarcasm and hyperbole are fun tools to frame whisky in, but it seems like every other week I see a recycled post with a title like “X Reasons You Should Drink More Whisky”. Don’t get me wrong, I love whisky, and I hold a special place in my heart for hyperbolic sarcasm, but there are so many classier ways to help whisky’s reputation than to cram excessive consumption down our throats with cheap fratire. Bloggers and whisky champions who repost this kind of low-hanging fruit are often desperate to find new, entertaining content but too lazy to spill their brain tears and craft it themselves.

If you want to listen to douche bags misuse the word “epic” to justify ramping up your consumption while taking part in what sounds like a gender neutral push for date rape, you can watch fun YouTube videos, like this. Yes, if you have a misconception about whisky, according to the producers of this video, you apparently have “sand in your vagina”. I’d say it’s better to have sand in your crotch than rocks in your head, which is something I imagine the whisky-chugging dimwits who made this must suffer from.

So okay, the first example was clearly an attempt to be aggressively satirical towards prudish non-whisky appetites. I get it, and comedy gets a free pass despite the allusion to other half-truths in the video as if they were truly so uncomplicated. I don’t believe humorous tidbits like this actually contribute to mindless consumption, so much as celebrate that it’s already here. There is a scarier side to this type of post, though.

There are just as many people in this same vein of pseudo comedy, making very serious medical claims as to why you should drink more whisky. For instance, you might have heard from list-makers like Buzzfeed that whisky prevents stroke, heart disease, and cancer. Heavy alcohol consumption actually has a strong connection to heart disease, the number one killer of humans worldwide (number ONE!), but I’ll be sure to tell the next set of hardened arteries I see, that the deadly solvent their owners were inundating themselves with probably wasn’t the cause. I wasn’t even 18 before the first time I saw someone, my friend’s father, pass away from alcohol-related heart disease. There are also strong correlations between non-moderated alcohol consumption and cirrhosis/liver disease, brain and nerve damage, depression, and pancreatitis. What these viral bullshit bunkers conveniently leave out is that any health benefit anyone has ever found correlated with alcohol stops after 1-2 drinks in a day. Do you think the monkeys down at Buzzfeed writing this crap stop doing keg stands and high-fiving each other after two drinks? Doubtful.

The authors of these regurgitated puff pieces can hide behind plausible deniability, or claims that they’re not responsible for the world. They can decry “nanny states” or point to the links all they want, but they’re not encouraging healthier lifestyles. They’re encouraging an increase in consumption. If they wanted your heart to be healthy they would have to work much harder to write a comedic article like “10 excellent reasons your fat ass needs more exercise”.

And just in case the shining beacon of brilliant humanity that is Buzzfeed hasn’t convinced you to let go of that pesky job and turn to day drinking, even the Washington Post is in on the train-wreck of irresponsibility that’s trying to turn whisky into snake oil. Yes, the US hasn’t failed because we’ve fallen behind on education or let our poverty rates skyrocket; it’s because we aren’t as wasted as France. Clearly. Nice job, Washington Post, but you forgot the other huge reasons we’ve failed as a country: per capita, we don’t blow as many lines of coke as Spain or shoot as much smack as the UK.

It’s fun to drink and revel, and whisky is undeniably awesome. Personally, I love the stuff and I’ll be the first to admit that it sounded reasonable, maybe even funny, the first time I saw a post like that, but let’s never forget that alcohol can and does ruin lives and that people don’t really need a reason to drink MORE whisky. They need a reason to drink BETTER whisky. There should be a balanced conversation about the subject, and most of the information out there is definitely not. It’s okay to drink. It’s even okay to drink a lot if you choose to, but don’t be one of those trend-following pinheads spouting non-truths to justify your decision. Take some responsibility and own your choices.

There are lots of different kinds of whisky out there, and just about as many different kinds of whisky drinkers. It’s a diverse culture and which type of drinker you surround yourself with can have a significant effect on your experience. To help guide you on your journey I’ve compiled this list.

The Snob – The snob only drinks single cask, single malt Scotch. They may or may not own a decanter; if they do own one, then they’re blissfully ignorant of how terrible decanters are for whisky. The snob has never tasted Jack Daniel’s, mostly out of principal. They also usually write a successfully agreeable blog that appeals to other snobs. They never swear and get an enviable amount of free shit.

The Anti-Snob – The Anti-snob usually loves crap like Old Crow and Ancient Age. They incessantly repeat that age doesn’t matter. The Anti-Snob loves ice and also loudly proclaims that people are entitled to their own opinions. They are easily infuriated by people who’s opinions are that ice, Old Crow and Ancient Age are awful. They call people snobs for having negative opinions while completely unaware of the irony of their own demand that people never imply demands. When they meet a garden variety snob, both drinkers are pulled together and cancel each other out in an explosive flash of light, having been transformed into pure energy.

The Status Drinker – The Status Drinker has an enormous whisky dungeon… sometimes next to their porn dungeon. Nobody is really sure how much it costs or whether the owner is capable of drinking it all in one lifetime. They love to tell long-winded stories about certain bottles and brag about obscenely priced ones, but will never drink or sell them. Probably lonely, and may be existentially depressed. They almost always own whisky stones, whisky condoms (whatever those are), an aerator and $200 worth of assorted glassware. Curiously, the Status Drinker also has the exact same opinion about any brand as the one published in Whisky Advocate magazine.

The Loyalist – This one is a peculiar fellow. The Loyalist claims they love whisky… but only drinks one brand, like Jameson. In fact, you’re pretty sure they haven’t tried anything else, ever. When presented with a brand outside of their experience they don’t know what to do or say. The loyalist is easily identified by the frequency with which they posts pictures of their brand on Facebook or Twitter. Getting upset when you go out and their brand isn’t available, the Loyalist often willingly drinks Coors Light as a replacement.

The Mel Gibson – In true asshole form, the Mel Gibson often buys rare whisky while it’s still widely available and immediately tries to sell it on the Bourbon Exchange for a 300% markup. They are bizarrely self-righteous and ironically out of touch with the things they love. Frequently, they tell you things are blasphemous. The Mel Gibson usually hates Jews, but only vocalizes it when drunk, and always needs a long series of meaningful punches in the face.

The Cigar Guy/Gal – The Cigar Guy or Gal always disagrees with your comments about the flavor or aroma of particular whisky, because they can’t really smell. They also make wild accusations like, this Auchentoshan Valinch smells peaty, this Ardbog is terrible, or this whisky is great with this cigar. Will make your house smell like formaldehyde and cat urine if you give them the chance. Smells bad even after showering which means they’re also very likely to slay your face with their perfume, cologne, or Axe body spray.

The Diet Coke Guy/Gal – Hangs out at dive bars and only owns shot glasses. Might still be in college. Can I get a chaser with that? Make it a Diet Coke. What are you talking about? Diet Coke is delicious! The Diet Coke whisky drinker never sips their whisky. They are also completely comfortable with honey flavored Dewar’s and don’t see what all the fuss is about. Their counter tops are chronically sticky, and despite their inability to enjoy the flavor of hard liquor, they have an impressive, full-stocked bar.

The Googler – Loves Jim Murray and top ten lists. Googlers might even write a few lists themselves. Pappy Van Winkle is da shit! Also, there is no difference between Pappy Van Winkle and Van Winkle Special Reserve; it’s all, apparently, Pappy. Buffalo who? Hold on (typing typing typing)… oh, I get it; yeah they’re good, too. The Googler paradoxically believes that Bourbon can only be made in Kentucky, despite the accessibility of the Federal Code that defines it. The Googler doesn’t follow one blog so much as Google whatever whisky they want to know about and take whichever blog comes up as gospel.

The Contrarian – The grand hipster of whisky, The Contrarian invariably hates whatever you like. They think the old stuff was better and only drink cheap swill, but claim to have loads of high-end whisky experience. Sometimes seen wearing bowties, the Contrarian often smells bad and listens to annoying music while drinking.

The Grammar Whore – This one swears there’s a difference between whisky and whiskey. The Grammar Whore is also blissfully unaware of the etymology of the word and would much rather attack your spelling errors than have a conversation about whisky where they can respectfully disagree with you. They typically love unnecessary distinction, semi-colons, and Oxford commas. The grammar whore not only knows what an ad hominem attack is, but has used that very phrase at least twice while making an ad hominem argument themselves.

The Troll – Pretty much anyone who is going to comment on this post with some snarky bullshit. Bourbon sucks, Scotch sucks, and Canadian whisky really sucks. Yes, I’m talking to you. Trololololol.

Yours Truly

The Blogger aka The Know It All – The Blogger is the hugest dick of them all. They often make fun of random whiskies and people for increasingly esoteric reasons. May or may not be a brand whore. Probably doesn’t know what they’re talking about and has a hard time just enjoying a whisky without having to vocalize dumb observations about it. The Blogger often lords over people for things like whether or not they have business cards, whether or not they accept or disclose free samples, the size of their collection, people they know, or how much better they are at writing than you are. Avoid at all costs.

Whisky is just beer without any hops, distilled and then matured in an oak cask.

This is a mantra almost every whisky fan has heard at least once in their lifetime. In fact, if you’ve gone to any number of public tastings you’ve probably heard it more times than you can remember… but it’s not true.

While it is a common adage, one created to make explaining production to whisky-virgins easier, it’s one promulgated by Scottish brand ambassadors and only fits in with the European definitions of whisky. There, the acceptable ingredients are limited to water, yeast, grain and wood. In America, we do whatever the hell we want, so long as we have enough money to shut up the naysayers. Sometimes, we don’t even age our stuff in casks. Now, we’re adding hops and we don’t even have to tell you that they’re in there. This is America! What now, bitch?!

In France and many Germanic countries, spirit made from grain and hops goes by a few different names: eau de vie de bier, bierschnaps or grappa di bier, among others. Part of the distinction lies in the hops themselves, though the other part is commonly related to aging. Only a handful of eau de vie de bier brands choose to mature in casks, and often not long enough to qualify as whisky by the EU definition. Despite the word whisky‘s coincidental similarity to eau de vie (both share an etymology that trace back to the translation, water of life) these are technically different products. In the US, though, there are ways around the age issue, and putting hops in the mix isn’t always a deal-breaker either.

For a long time, I believed that if you added hops to a whisky’s mash bill, you had to add the phrase “hop-flavored” to the label. It was it’s own category. The main culprit behind that notion was Charbay, a distillery in California; the first to use the label “hop-flavored” on their whisky. They would and do tell people that they were the first to consider using bottle-ready brewer’s beer instead of the sour distiller’s beer commonly used in whisky, and that the TTB gave them a new category to be able to do it. Hops were forbidden, according to their narrative, just ignore their new Doubled and Twisted light whisky, which bears hops in the mash and a mysterious lack of the words flavored or hops on the label.

In hindsight, I feel extremely gullible. Charbay’s argument is very hard to swallow: distillation and brewing have been around for a very long time, so long that history surrounding it is lost or murky at best. Bierschnaps is not a new invention, either. The idea that nobody ever thought of distilling drinking beer and aging it in a cask is as ridiculous as the price of the first, two-year old Whisky Charbay sold. People have been brewing and filling their casks with anything and everything they could get their hands on since the very beginning. Also, there are documented examples of putting hops in American whisky mash going back as far the 1700’s.

Hop-flavored means that the whisky has, literally, been flavored, the way you flavor coffee with hazelnut creamer or mulled cider with a cinnamon stick. Every other artisan distiller making the flavored stuff has the integrity to be completely upfront about their unusual techniques. Corsair floats a basket of hops in the still to infuse their hop flavor, while Sons of Liberty and New Holland both dry hop the finished spirit. So it only makes sense that Charbay is also adding hops somewhere other than the mash to earn the label flavored. Exactly where it happens, they won’t say, but during a phone conversation with him, head distiller Marko Karakasevic did eventually relent and admit that there is more to the story than their simplified ad campaign leads you to believe and that the specifics are “none of your business”.

The inescapable truth is that heat is the enemy of hoppy flavor. When brewing beer, the earliest additions of hops quickly boil off into bitter vegetal notes. The later you add hops into the equation, the more bright hoppy flavor will end up in the brew, so many beer brewers choose to add their last dose of hops within the last ten minutes of the boil, or even afterward, to keep the flavors bright. Hop oils are some of the earliest things to boil off in a brew pot or still and most of it (not all) ends up in the discarded heads, so it’s no surprise why the hop flavored whisky distillers choose to adulterate the spirit inside the still, or later, with additional hops. The spirit needs help to really pack in that hoppy flavor. It is, coincidentally, also because of that volatility that you can use hops in a whisky mash and not call it hop flavored whisky.

There are uses for hops other than flavor. Hops are anti-microbial, and can help keep bad bacteria at bay while yeast takes hold in a substrate. Samuel M’Harry’s 1809 book, The Practical Distiller, talks about using hops to help propagate yeast. Bourbon-lord Chuck Cowdery offers some anecdotal evidence, as well. For a contemporary example, Maker’s Mark uses hops to keep their dona tanks clean today, while they build up the yeast before adding it to their mash. Technically, none of those are examples of hops directly in the mash though.

The efforts from George Washington’s resurrected Mount Vernon distillery and Ohio’s Indian Creek both bring hops a little closer to the mash. Both harness the antimicrobial power and make a hop tea. They use this tea as the mash water to help keep bad bacteria out of the mash. This was once a very common practice in whisky, though as other, cheaper sterilization methods surfaced, like steam, the practice of using hops to manage clean fermentation became less common.

So, if you use hops the same way distillers are allowed to use enzymes, to aid fermentation, the flavor is considered traditional and the addition of hops is considered irrelevant to the label. Passage 27 CFR 5.23 A(2) of the Federal Code states that any class of whisky (the one exception being straight whisky) may contain up to 2.5% harmless blending materials “which are customarily employed herein in accordance with established trade usage”. That means so long as you’re smart enough to provide the TTB with the historical precedent and the hops don’t drastically alter the flavor of the result in a wildly uncharacteristic way, it’s a perfectly legitimate adjunct. Although the paperwork and science paves the way for it, the three examples I’ve provided so far still aren’t putting hops directly in the mash bill.

photo from Albert Savarese

Enter 287, an American Pale Ale brewed by Captain Lawrence Brewing, distilled by Still the One and aged in virgin oak casks for about a year. This is a product that fits legally into the official American category malt whisky with no hop-flavored declaration despite the addition of hops directly in the mash. One small caveat, if any collectors out there can find this whisky now, grab it up. Future editions will not have hops in the mash bill. The distiller claims that the hops flavors all fall outside of the cut anyways, so to save money Captain Lawrence is no longer adding hops in future mashes… but they can and did and it did taste hoppy.

So why is this news? Well, part of it is the TTB’s code of silence. If you call an agent and ask them about the issue, not only are you dealing with a blank canvas and an individual interpretation of the Federal Code, but they won’t comment on any other distillery’s product or methods. Upfront, this seems like an honorable enough way to protect trade secrets. It limits information we receive as the public to what the distilleries are willing to divulge, but it also helps keep the history of distillation a secret to future generations and makes making a historical argument for your technique much harder. Distillery X might be making whisky with cat litter as an adjunct, making it a legitimate addition per 27 CFR 5.23 A(2) for other distilleries, but you would never know. If your TTB agent had never seen it before they might even prevent you from doing something which is already a common practice. The very laws meant to protect us and clearly identify the spirit in the bottle paradoxically provide a place for obscurity regarding its ingredients.

So from now on, should you ever find yourself reaching for that mantra to explain what whisky is, remember: whisky is just beer… distilled and then matured in an oak cask.

EDIT 11/23/13: One important thing I left out of the original post, but should have included, the bright hops oil may boil off in the heads, but there is a leftover bitter flavor that doesn’t boil off so quickly. According to the distillery, the bitterness that does not boil off in the heads is left in the tails, though, so it makes its escape by simply being left in the still with the feints. Also worth mentioning, though they claim the actual hops flavor may be cut out of the final product, the notion that hops are a totally irrelevant adjunct is incorrect. Even if you were to completely cut out every chemical trace from the hops, an impossible task, the use of hops still affects the flavor of the end result by affecting the fermentation.

My blog’s title, How to Drink Whisky, is a tongue in cheek joke, and at times, a satirical theme. I’ve heard so many people say things like “only a jerk would tell someone how to drink their whisky,” that I chose that phrase in jest, to mock them, the Chuck Cowderys of the world who use the word snob to deride people. After all, if you don’t like someone’s opinion enough to label them so derisively, are you not as guilty of snobbish opinion-posturing as they are? Calling anybody a snob is an ironic exercise in meta-snobbery. Oh, so that person over there is vocal about being picky and you feel like lording over people that way is wrong? Perhaps lording over them about their pickiness will take care of that disparity for you.

It’s true that for many people whisky is simply a status. I love the stuff but, personally, I’m not on-board with the status part. I will try an $8 bottle as quickly as a $100 bottle, any style, any age, any proof, blended or not. It needs to be said though, that if someone wants to buy whisky for the status, it’s okay. That’s their right to ignore the delicious pantheon of whisky laid out before them and only buy single malts. It’s fine if they think Bourbon is the only whisky bold enough to satisfy their spirit-lust. It’s alright if they refuse to drink anything blended. Take a deep breath, meta-snobs. It’s okay.

Perhaps the most famous example of meta-snobbery happens during the argument about chilling whisky with ice or stones. There are plenty of justifications as to why you shouldn’t, but for some reason the cry for freedom trumps all courtesy, and people who like cold whisky will often act like you just pushed their kid off of a subway platform for mentioning that cold and whisky don’t mix. I have been called a snob more times than I can count for saying so.

If we were talking about cooking and I were to tell you that salt can increase the receptive nature of your electrolytic taste buds, making your spaghetti sauce taste better, are you going to call me a sauce-snob? Are Buddhists really just moment-snobs for trying to squeeze the most enjoyment out of each minute of their life by meditating? Are science teachers fact-snobs? Or better yet, consider this: if you saw your neighbor shoveling snow with a garden trowel, would telling them about snow-shovels make you a shovel-snob? You can still shovel your snow any way you’d like, just don’t call me a snob for pointing out that I think there’s a better way to do it. I would actually argue that only a jerk would watch a neighbor struggle like that, even if it turns out that they’re enjoying the labor.

That breed of anti-intellectualism is the very same that locked Galileo up for suggesting a heliocentric solar system. It caused mathematically literate women and strong swimmers to be burned as witches. It bans books and destroys art. Promoting ignorance on the grounds that your personal preference is too sacred to question will inevitably lead you awry, no matter which variety of the word freedom you use to try and justify it.

That’s not to say that there aren’t folks who are too loud for their own good on both sides of any argument or that anyone should ever legislate how you drink your whisky. In fact, you should experiment. You should try everything at least once. Live a little, but don’t be offended when someone points out that you just squashed all the trademark spice in that $100 bottle of Talisker by icing it down, or that Bourbon prides itself on being bolder and heartier so adding ice is, metaphorically, cutting off its balls. Ultimately, if you want to drink some watery eunuch of a spirit, that’s your prerogative as much as it’s mine to say I don’t like it. I like talking about whisky, but if all you can say is that Woodford Reserve on the rocks is wicked smooth then I’m afraid we don’t have much else to talk about other than ice and whisky.

There will be a time for cheap ice-worthy blends. There will be a time for Sazeracs and Whisky Sours. There will be a time for shamelessly over-priced status whisky and the reasonably awesome stuff, too. Being satirical or hyperbolic about it doesn’t make me a snob. Thinking that it does is sillier than only drinking one type of whisky and using heaping piles of ice to make it palatable. But like all these whiskies, there also is a time to shut up, stop bickering and raise a glass, so…

To the meta-snobs: Cheers!!!

(For the record, you can buy Mr. Cowdery’s book, the one you see signed at the beginning of this post, on his website here. You can also ask him, as I did, to inscribe it any way you wish…)

Sometimes it’s best to stand on the shoulders of giants. Sometimes it’s better to blaze your own trail. I’ve read a lot of blogs, books and reviews about the drink and one of the biggest problems I have is how we all communicate the value of the experience we had.

Many people imitate the 100 point system pioneered by Robert Parker. Some folks choose 5 star systems or 10 stars… or 5 stars with half-star increments. Some choose 20 points or 50. Then again, there are many that choose not to use ratings at all. I think most systems are too specific, though a lack of any rating at all leaves me to the perilous task of reading between the lines and I don’t always like having to do that.

I’m a fan for the obvious as much as I am for the accurate, still, I would argue that for as much value as a rating has it has just as many flaws. It’s a necessary evil in the end, so here’s what I came up with. Four categories. Neat and professional, without a lot of room for misunderstanding.

Highly Recommend: These are ones that I not only enjoy, I enjoy them on a deeply spiritual level. I crave them.

Recommended: These are what I consider top of their class. There are better, but there’s no sense in being a snob about it.

Try it: If you asked me to help you buy a bottle, these ones might not come up, but that’s not to say you shouldn’t try them.

Risky: Let’s face it… it happens. I would recommend you skip these ones, unless you’re painfully curious like me.

I’ve gone and updated all my old reviews and must say I’m much happier with the results. I hope you find it as useful! Thanks for reading!